


The Key Thou Shalt Turn

by rannadylin



Category: Pillars of Eternity
Genre: Angst, Found Family, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-07
Updated: 2018-11-07
Packaged: 2019-08-19 23:19:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16544237
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rannadylin/pseuds/rannadylin
Summary: Time heals the wounds of the Inquisition, and Ianthina, once an Inquisitor, returns to her mentor, Thaos, agreed in purpose if not always in methods. Time also brings new wounds: her mentor is dying. For Ianthina, a priest of Berath, this should be business as usual, but Thaos is different.





	The Key Thou Shalt Turn

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Bazylia_de_Grean](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bazylia_de_Grean/gifts).



> It took me a long time to figure out who my Watcher Violet’s past life as an Inquisitor was, and once I finally had some vague notions, Bazylia soon adopted her as a muse too, writing of Ianthina first coming to Thaos’ notice as an acolyte, and of her returning to his side after the Inquisition. Now Ianthe has started talking to me, too, it seems, and this fic takes place years after both of those. I recommend tissues handy. I also recommend a look at the wiki entry or in-game lore book on Berathian scripture. ;-)

She has said last rites for many a soul, in the years since she returned to Berath’s temple as the fires of the Inquisition cooled to ash. Even if the hand that turns the Wheel is not all that she once believed Berath to be, it is still enough, and the work is still needed -- both the work of the gods in the Beyond and the work of their priests on Eora. She has comforted souls that met their end with glad heart and cheerful countenance; she has done the god’s bidding with a gentle nudge -- or more -- where a soul would turn back on the portal. None escape Berath’s embrace in the end, whether Ianthina is there to encourage them or to shove them on through; it is all the same to her.

But this soul is different. The prayers that Ianthina intones at his bedside, the prayers she has spoken for decades, some of which she helped to write as an acolyte here...parts of them, in this case, aren’t precisely true.

“Walk the path and welcome _change_ ,” she repeats: not praying it this time, as she did moments ago; at her arched eyebrow and snort of irony, Thaos only smiles. They are decades past admonitions and corrections for such irreverence, after all. And it would not matter now.

He can cite the same scripture she can, of course. He was writing it lifetimes before she began. “I approach the door the same as any soul, child,” he answers. Ianthina’s heart constricts with the strain in his voice. It will not be long now. She has prayed at too many deathbeds to convince herself otherwise.

Still, she has to disagree with his humble assertion. Not many have earned the freedom of contradicting the Grandmaster, especially not after the Inquisition demonstrated the potential price of doing so, but he is in the habit now of hearing Ianthina out. She understands that he can afford to do so, since in the end she will always defer to his judgment if she cannot convince him to her own. She is no Iovara. And for her loyalty, she has the unparalleled privilege of bending his ear even when it is not what he wants to hear.

“Perhaps the _approach_ is the same,” she corrects him now, “but it is not Berath, I think, who guides _you_ to your destination beyond the portal.”

“Even so,” he admits that much, “the path _is_ the same.”

“Hm.” She smoothes a wrinkle in the quilt that lies, it seems, as heavy on him now as the years this turn of the Wheel has amassed. She realizes now that he has been slowing for the last several of those years, no longer the constantly busy Grandmaster she has followed since her youth, always showing up when you least expect him, knowing every acolyte’s business as well as their hopes and doubts, always disappearing from the temple complex on business of his own at the gods’ bidding, always so _strong_ and so _certain_ and so... _constant._

But these last several years, he has stayed closer to home, delegated more of his work than usual. He has even been _sick_ more times than she can remember in all the decades of her long service here; nothing too serious, just the normal hardships of mortal life that pass after a few days’ discomforts. But before these twilight years, he had seemed practically immune to all such nuisances. His hair, which first began yielding its color in the aftermath of the Inquisition, has faded all to white now, and his skin bears far more wrinkles than the quilt. He is _old_ , Ianthina concludes, surprised at how that simple fact of life has eluded her before this moment. The downside of being an elf: she underestimates sometimes the swiftness of other kith lives. Thaos, across his incarnations, has already spent far more years in the gods’ service than Ianthina will ever hope to live before her soul returns to the Wheel to become someone new, but in this moment, in this lifetime, he is very much due for a restart. How very impractical.

She only realizes she has spoken that last thought aloud when Thaos turns to slowly raise his eyebrows at her. “Impractical? After all these years, my Ianthina, do you of all people doubt the necessity of the Wheel?”

“Of course not,” she huffs. “But I do wonder why you must be cut off from the _change_ inherent in the cycle. Why not come back as an elf sometimes? Surely the work you are called to do could be better served with more years in which to --”

“Ianthina,” he soothes, or chides. It is often much the same, she finds. “The interruption will be brief, child. And I have safeguards in place, that the work need not unravel in my absence. Among which safeguards, you know, is _your_ role.”

“I know,” she nods. She is honored and proud that he has chosen her for this, to bridge the gap while his soul finds its way back from the Wheel. Respectfully, she lowers her head. “I will see it done, Your Eminence.” And then, because of the years between them and because of his slight frown at the customary title _and_ because she is, after all, Berath’s high priest now as he is Woedica’s -- well, not _quite_ as he is, she corrects her thought; no one’s role is quite as his is -- she raises her eyes with a cheeky grin and amends, “Thaos.” And he smiles. “All will be in order when you are ready to resume your place,” she assures him, “since, you will note, _I_ am an elf and shall barely note the passing of those years.” But the catch in her voice betrays her flippant attempt at confidence.

He notices, of course. “Do not be so certain, High Priest of Berath, that your god will not usher _you_ along this path sooner than you expect.” Stern words, but gently spoken, and as she nods, again lowering her head in respect, he reaches for her hand. “But not, I think, before I see you again.”

Berath gives, and Berath takes away. Her parents enjoyed nowhere near the span of years due their race. Ianthina first came to this place, fresh from that loss, to Thaos and his gods, for the comfort that if there must be Death in Life, there is also Life in Death. But loss has pursued her, and while there is comfort in knowing that mortal life begins anew as surely as it ends, the spaces in her life vacated by loss remain empty, monuments to memory of souls who for a while touched hers. She had a friend, sent to carry word of the gods to a far country too soon for Ianthina to go as well. It has been decades, and Glynis is probably still alive, though it is years now since they last exchanged letters, and orlan lives are shorter even than folk. She had a lover, training here with her, but he was swayed by Iovara’s teachings. It has been decades since the Inquisition shoved _his_ soul back to the Wheel along with so many of the heretics.

It has been decades, too, since she found in Thaos a mentor -- a purpose -- a _father_. As he seemed larger than life, so she has been thinking him larger than Death. But the space in her life where his soul touches hers frays already at the edges.

It won’t mend when he is gone, she supposes, any more than the others. That empty monument will remain, while she takes up his tasks. For a time. She will note the passing of those years, perhaps, more than she has noted the passing years of their lives thus far. She may as well be counting down the days.

The gods turn the Wheel, but her hope in this case is more than the knowledge that his soul will return to life again, in some new life as all others do, unrecognizable to the friends who bear its loss. For he may approach the door as all others do, but he is indeed, in a sense, larger than Death. Woedica would not have her Favored welcome change as Berath bids the rest. So Ianthina will note the passing of the years, keep his house in order, and in no more time than it has taken them to grow so comfortable with each other, she will welcome him home again.

She smiles with this assurance. “Until then, I shall see that the craft of kith and wilder does not disturb what bones the gods have buried.”

He nods, something wry about the wrinkles at his eyes. “And no doubt be much kinder about it than I would.”

“Certainly, when I can.” She smirks, gripping his bony fingers lightly, but indulges him once more in the practiced argument. “Kindness can have unlooked-for returns. Would _I_ still be here, at your side, if not for your kindness to me as an acolyte?”

His look grows fond, but then he fixes her with the Grand Inquisitor stare, the one he had always used when he thought only her respect for authority would make his next words palatable. It hasn’t worked on her in years, not really; but she always hears him out as surely as he hears her rebuttals. “You will do what must be done, though.” By his tone, he means it as a charge to do so, but really it is just the truth. She will. She always has. She returns his stare with a look of exasperation that says as much, wordlessly.

“And I will do it your way, when I must, and my way, when I can,” she assures him. Such has been their work together, all these years since she returned to him. In the Inquisition she saw his ruthlessness, unchecked; but in the aftermath she accepted the necessity of his purpose, if not his methods. With her loyalty came his trust, and with his trust came, bit by bit, the stories of the world into which his people birthed the gods. Eora is disorderly enough now, but without them.... Ianthina would not have his work undone. But she has done her part to limit the _at any cost_ implicit in his mission. “I still think,” she adds after a moment’s hesitation, mindful that now may not be the best time to reopen _this_ old argument, “the secrecy will turn on us, someday. I cannot be the only soul who would choose to follow the gods still, after knowing what they truly are. Io-” he winces, and she adjusts: “The apostate’s teaching was inflammatory in its nature, but any practical person who hears of our gods without sparing the truth of their origin should still see their value, their necessity, and --”

“Ianthina,” Thaos smiles, but she thinks his eyelids droop lower than they did minutes ago. “You overestimate the practicality of most kith. You, my dear, are an exception.”

She bristles. Then she sighs. She is practical enough to know he is right about most kith, after all. “Still,” she says in a small voice, “there must be some. Perhaps someday, we can let others in on the secret, not too many, but…”

“Promise me,” he whispers, “that in my absence you will not do anything rash.”

“No,” she murmurs, even as at that moment she feels his hand go slack, as her god’s chimes stir with his last breath, calling him onwards. “No, my father,” she whispers once more, “not without you. That can wait a lifetime.”


End file.
